Majority of society believes that the woman who chooses not to ever get married or have children, will be miserable in her later years. The gag is, we are all more familiar with miserable married people with children in their later years. So miserable, that their entire focus becomes their children and not their lives. Even in adulthood, their children have to cater to their desires and timeline because these parents are now living through them. I have aunts who never married and had children, they were treated like cautionary tales growing up,

“If you keep on being so stubborn, no one will marry you like Aunt Sybil”… Aunt Sybil was in her late 30s, looking twenty somn and working as a head chef at a high end hotel restaurant. I just never saw the problem. Meanwhile the aunties who were warning me not to be like Aunt Sybil, looked older than her, even though she was older than them. Their husbands came and went as they pleased, and they walked on eggshells around them, quick to shush their children when Daddy was about. Pretty much my nightmare. I never saw what everyone else saw,

And I never wished what everyone else wished. I did see marriages growing up that seemed cute, Uncle O was 31, goodlooking, established and his beautiful wife was his girlfriend since law school, they lived in a gorge apartment in Ikoyi, they teased each other, and laughed a lot

They had 3 cute kids in a succession, I was like…okay a couple I can relate to, they are friends, this isn’t some master/obedient wife relationship which seems to be the case with marriages thus far. This makes sense to me. It made sense until my cousin who went to law school in Jos moved in with us to find a job in Lagos. Uncle O met her on one of the occasions he would come visiting, and became obsessed. This man would come bearing all sorts of gifts, imploring my cousin to date him. It was…completely ridiculous to witness as a kid. Everyone treated it so normal though, they all laughed about how persistent he was and how much he “loved” my cousin. My cousin hated him with a passion and would be so upset when anyone would tease her about him. This man had no shame, he would come with his wife and children and ask where my cousin was, “Where is that my friend? wink wink”, like…I just quietly closed my appreciation of his marriage after that debacle and reset it back to “Women are too often disrespected and disregarded in marriages, so why is everyone gung ho about it?”.

Uncle O’s wife had 3 more children, and naturally began to look a lot older than him. He stayed fit and spry and by this time had amassed so much money, he was “attractive”. As we got older, to hang, he would tell us his nasty jist, like how he had twin gfs who were 22. Okay Unc

We let him cook so we could enjoy the cash that came with listening to his “baby boy” tales. His wife went from being sweet and accepting, to becoming very materialistic and cold. The most random things had to be name brand, nothing less than the best.

You see that a lot with women married to disrespectful rich men. The defense mechanism is, spending a shit load of his money, trying to ignore the fuck out of his shenanigans, and just focusing on what you have and what your children need. So to me, I have never understood the need to villanize

The concept of a single, childless woman. So much work is done to paint her as pathetic and incomplete, when in reality, very often, women who are married, fit that description. Being miserable has nothing to do with your relationship status, and it has everything to do with

How you perceive life and how you are able to deal with the blows that life deals. A woman is not just miserable because she is single and childless, that is not how it works. A woman who has chosen to be happy in life and is able to center herself, no matter what she faces

Will never be miserable, within or without a relationship and with or without children. Marriage and children is not what makes every woman happy and it is beyond time everyone learned that. There is nothing wrong with you for not feeling the need to want marriage or children

Yet or at all. The reason why we so often question ourselves, is because society tells us that we would be miserable if we don’t hop to it. It is not a race, if you change your mind at a later time, you are not going to be too old to find a husband, the men you don’t want right now are not going to be men you will regret not giving a chance to. Everyone loves threatening women with that, “You are too picky ..when you are old and you can’t find a husband, you will wish you married this nice man who comes around pestering you”. No I won’t.

I don’t regret any of the men I never wanted, they were rejected for valid reasons. And if at any point that I look back on them because I am lonely, then I will know that I am being desperate and idealistic, and not realistic. I would know that it is up to me to do something

To get myself back to being happy, because it is my responsibility to be kind and loving to myself. It means I will not fool myself, by pretending that my happiness is based on the presence of another person, because I am too lazy to do the work of knowing myself and finding out

What makes me happy outside of a romantic relationship. I am too busy following societal rules which tell women that we cannot be happy unless we are paired with someone. So this man that my mind, body & soul did not want, is not the key to my happiness, just because I am lonely.

Everyone has regrets, however I stand firm with eschewing romantic regrets. Loneliness makes us idealize, makes what you rejected, seem not as bad. There are several married people, who are currently idealizing the exes they rejected. Painful, unnecessary & unrealistic.

In conclusion, no one can predict misery based on relationship status. To assign it to single women, is one of the most aggressive actions of patriarchy. It has resulted in so many women rushing into relationships that rendered them actually miserable. Women are miserable. And telling themselves that they are at least not as miserable as their single friends, who appear to be happier, freer and in more control of their lives than they are. It is the oddest thing. If you read through this thread, I hope you lose that outdated belief today.